A Discussion of The Auctioneer with Bookshelf Beats

I recently did a fun little interview with Gino Sorcinelli over at Bookshelf Beats. We talked about a favorite novel of both of ours, the 1975 chiller The Auctioneer by the late Joan Samson. Hope you dig our talk, and we may discuss more about horror fiction later this summer!

Top 10 of '10: My Favorite Horror Reads of the Year

Since I don't read contemporary horror fiction, I have no idea what the "best horror of 2010" is. This probably comes as no surprise to you. The following "vintage" reads were the books I dug the most this year, the ones I insist that all horror fiction fans read as soon as they can, and that I think will give some sense of the depth and breadth of the genre we love so much. Some were rereads, some not, but I loved them all and treasure my well-worn copies. From quiet horror to splatterpunk horror, from Gothic horror to erotic horror, from literary horror to pulp horror, I think this list covers the genre pretty well. The list is alphabetical by author.

Wormwood, Poppy Z. Brite (1994) - Essential short stories that show the growth of a young writer and her new vision for modern horror.
All Heads Turn as the Hunt Goes By, John Farris (1977) - A vivid and original kind of Southern Gothic complete with Freudian neuroses.
Live Girls, Ray Garton (1987) - Sleazy good fun with scary/sexy vampire ladies.
The Search for Joseph Tully, William H. Hallahan (1974) - I've read nothing else like it: a psychological mystery with blasts of suggestive, chilling horror.
The Sundial, Shirley Jackson (1958) - An end-of-the-world fable with the ruthless character disintegration Jackson's known for.
Dark Gods, T.E.D. Klein (1985) - Four short novels of classic literary horror that echo Lovecraft, Machen, James, etc. but alive with very modern concerns.
Falling Angel, William Hjortsberg (1978) - Hard-boiled crime fiction and satanic horror collide in the New York City of the 1950s.
The Auctioneer, Joan Samson (1975) - Her only novel, one about doomed people who can't seem to help themselves for helping others.
Floating Dragon, Peter Straub (1982) - A towering, near-epic example of bestselling 1980s horror.
Finishing Touches, Thomas Tessier (1986) - The power of eros to drive and destroy our lives cannot be denied.

Other works I was happy to find I still liked many years after first reading them included stories by Clark Ashton Smith and Charles Beaumont, as well as Kathe Koja's The Cipher and the zombie anthology Still Dead. Overall it was a very rewarding year; I discovered a good handful of writers to read and books to search for. And just as I'd hoped, my recent trip to Los Angeles provided me with more than a dozen "new" paperback horror novels that I can't wait to get to in the new year. See you then!

The Auctioneer by Joan Samson (1975): When the Man Comes Around

One of the most compulsively readable books I've come across for Too Much Horror Fiction, Joan Samson's only novel The Auctioneer (Avon, Jan 1977) is a virtually unheard-of work from mid-1970s bestseller-dom, the kind of old paperback you'd overlook at a flea market or used bookstore. The first time I heard of it was literally two or three weeks ago, when I was reading some background on The Other. Someone referred to Samson's book as an undeservedly forgotten, minor classic of quiet, unassuming horror comparable to Thomas Tryon's earlier novel, and that was it; I had to have it. Didn't take me long to find it at all, and even less time to read it. It's worth keeping an eye out for, and plenty of copies are on eBay and Amazon for cheap.

 

Arriving in the New England country town of Harlowe that has changed little in decades, the auctioneer is Perly Dunsmore, a smiling, confident stranger bearing not gifts but the desire to receive them, given gratis by the good people of this farming community. As the crimes of the 20th century start to seep into Harlowe, Dunsmore convinces the town's only policeman that deputies are needed, and in order to gather deputies, there needs to be an auction to raise money, perhaps even enough to procure an ambulance for Harlowe. We see all this through the eyes of the Moores, a proud family who unwittingly start the whole thing off by giving unused items from around their farm to be auctioned off: first some old wheels, then a buffet table, an old sink, unused tools...

 Current reprint edition

But Samson makes an interesting decision by keeping Dunsmore off-stage, as it were, for large portions of the novel, and we hear of his doings through Bob Gore, the policeman, as he relates them to John and Mim Moore and John's invalid mother. And when Dunsmore finally does make an appearance, he is charming, deferential, and polite, when the Moores see him in action doing his auctioneer's spiel. To the city folks who come to the auction he spins a lovely fable of country life, flattering the townspeople for their good Christian virtues as well as the people who wish to capture some of it. But each and every Thursday, Gore and Dunsmore arrive at the Moore farm, as well as everyone else's homes, quietly demanding something for free. The Moores give at first with no thought, for, as Mim says to their four-year-old daughter Hildie, "It's nothin' to do with us. Nothin' at all."

Joan Samson (1937-1976)

Samson, who sadly died of cancer shortly after the publication of this, her only novel, has a way with drawing you into the landscape of the Moores' lives and letting you feel their growing unease and quiet helplessness as the auctions increase. You get the sense it just wouldn't be neighborly to refuse Dunsmore. Who doesn't want to do good for Harlowe, Dunsmore reminds them, even as he seems to cast a spell over many of the right-thinking men in town as he deputizes them. Mim's words are so ironic it becomes more and more painful as the story goes on. This has everything to do with them.

 

Because, of course, after awhile some of those deputies - men the Moores have known all their lives - start showing up for castoff items. And this time they come armed. And they don't take castoff items anymore but property that has meaning and value to the Moores. And those in Harlowe that don't give freely? Certain accidents start being reported. A car crash. A shooting. A missing child. And the accidents always somehow get mentioned when John Moore tells Dunsmore and his deputies that no, this time is the last time, he has nothing left to give. But he does. He realizes he may have more to give than he'd ever thought.

Simply and strongly told, it's the kind of book you don't want to stop reading because there is such a sense of place and time and character and most of all, story. The Auctioneer unfolds slowly, with the tiniest hint of menace, with the seeds of destruction sown in the very first pages. Even with its unobtrusive sociopolitical allegory - which I can take or leave - this is a mainstream thriller that actually thrills, while touching on the brutal and uncomfortable fact that some victims give themselves piece by piece, bit by bit, to their tormentors, all the while refusing to see their complicity in their own inevitable doom.